Consultancy to establish UN Women’s programme on Economic Empowerment of Women

UN Women’s first new Strategic Plan 2011 to 2013, identifies priority programming areas and concrete targets related to strengthening women’s economic empowerment and financing gender equality. UN Women will strengthen gender responsive implementation of the decent work agenda, including social protection, and to adopt and implement measures to increase women’s access to, and control over, productive assets, including work in the formal and informal economies. UN Women will also work closely with Ministries of Finance, Planning and Statistics to support national planning and budgeting processes that promote gender equality, to enable committed governments to build their capacity in gender analysis, gender budgeting, and use of sex disaggregated data for more gender responsive public policy and budgets. To achieve this, UN Women’s Pacific Regional Office will launch a new multi-year Women’s Economic Empowerment Programme from 2011, which includes strategic interventions, advocacy, research/analysis, and communications and stakeholder networking activities. A four- pronged programme on economic empowerment has been designed to addresses the outcomes and resolutions of successive Pacific Ministerial Meetings on Women and Triennial Conferences of Pacific Women, including contributing to SPC’s harmonized gender statistics and monitoring of gender equality throughout the Pacific region, especially addressing the need for sex-disaggregated data to clearly show the gender impact of poverty and including unpaid work as part of the national accounts. The Proposed four-year programme, will be implemented in partnership with Regional Organisations, governments, women’s rights organisations and other NGOs, the private sector and other stakeholders, under the four strands of:   I. Empowering women in macroeconomic decision-making processes: Representation at PIFS / FEMM to present a gender perspective on economic and trade policies, their implications and impacts Making regional trade policymakers more accountable to women citizens in Pacific island states A regional database on social and economic indicators of gender equality/inequality in each Pacific Island state to monitor progress in closing gender gaps and reducing female poverty Research and analysis to support advocacy for gender-sensitive (and gender-just) economic and trade policy-making and gender-sensitive poverty-reduction impact assessments. advocacy training for women on trade and economic policy issues and processes Empowering women through law and other regulatory reforms to access productive resources: Addressing gender-differentiated impacts of land liberalization policies and land reform proposals in the Pacific Designing a pilot scheme for empowering women agricultural producers Researching women’s access to social protection and secure housing and proposing legislative and policy reforms Empowering women producers, entrepreneurs and migrant workers: Strengthening the economic security and rights of women market vendors Undertaking a valuation or ‘costing’ of women’s subsistence food production and care work. Engaging with Pacific-based businesses leaders in industries which employ women or purchase goods and/or services from women. Researching and preparing policy proposals to address key labour and migration issues Empowering women by increased financing for gender equality: Designing a PIC-relevant gender-budgeting project, for implementation in three countries. Designing a specific budget for EVAW legislation and related family law reform work, including estimates for health/social support services, law enforcement and preventive work. Assessing the merits and possibilities of introducing a tax on financial transactions to raise revenue for gender sensitive poverty reduction programmes  II. Consultancy: UN Women Pacific seeks the services of a suitably qualified and experienced consultant to serve as interim Economic Security and Rights (ESR) Programme Coordinator, to establish this programme over the next 5 months

Duties and Responsibilities

Under the overall supervision of the RPD and the direct supervision of the Chief Technical Adviser, the Economic Security and Rights (ESR) Programme Coordinator is responsible for the implementation of the first phase of the five year project design, which is the ESR Resource Mobilisation and Programme Establishment Strategy, as developed through the ESR Scoping Study. 1. Identify appropriate donors, and what funding such a programme would qualify for: Online search Approach gender and economics academics, researchers, activists on the issues for suggestions on who would support such a programme in the Pacific and go from there Look at associated projects (either in UN Women or other agencies/organisations) and approach those donors – as the ESR work would complement work they had previously been involved in. Approach existing UN Women donors Approach donors that have funded ESR work in other regions. 2. Concept notes: Develop concept notes for the different aspects of the five year program 3. Identify and consult with potential donors for various programme components 4. Develop the complete project documents to the standard required for approval at UN HQ 5. Engage and build relationships with other thematic programmes of UN Women work 6. Engage and build relationships with key partners as identified in the Phase 1 plan, including attending meetings, presenting for, representing UN Women on issues of Deliverables: Full Project Documentation developed and approved by UN Women HQ. Coherence of UN Women’s Economic Empowerment project with other key programming areas of UN Women Coordination of UN Women’s Economic Empowerment project with the contributions of other UN agencies and development partners. Partnerships with relevant organisations and partners documented

Competencies

Demonstrated familiarity with the issues of gender equality and women’s empowerment in the region. Demonstrated familiarity with issues of economic policy and human rights and development in the region. Extensive knowledge of governmental and inter-governmental mechanisms and processes, especially in budget making and policy for economic development. Familiarity with UN and the UN inter-agency collaboration in the field of gender and development and economic security and rights. Experience in managing researchers and publications Experience in Preparing project documentation and inception phase. Experience resource mobilisation Excellent communication, interpersonal and liaison skills Resident in the Pacific Region preferred, (Suva, Fiji residence ideal) Proficient in oral and written English Knowledge of one or more of the language of the countries in the Region an asset

Required Skills and Experience

Education: Social Science or a related field of development planning (Master’s degree level) with a focus on women and economic development Experience: Minimum 5 years of relevant development experience in the Pacific region Applications should include: Cover letter stating why you want to do this work, your capacity and experience that lead you to be able to fulfill the capacities required in (3) above, available start date Detailed CV UN Women P11.

UNDP is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence.